Vice-Admiral William Bligh, FRS (9 September 1754 – 7 December 1817) was a Royal Navy officer and colonial administrator who served as the governor of New South Wales from 1806 to 1808. He is best known for his role in the mutiny on HMS Bounty, which occurred in 1789 when the ship was under his command. The reasons behind the mutiny continue ...

Bligh assumed the prestigious Bounty appointment on 16 August 1787, at a considerable financial cost. His lieutenant's pay of four shillings a day (£70 a year) contrasted with the £500 a year he had earned as captain of Britannia.

Mar 4, 2025 · William Bligh (born September 9, 1754, probably at Plymouth, county of Devon, England—died December 7, 1817, London) was an English navigator, explorer, and commander of the HMS Bounty at the time of the celebrated mutiny on that ship.

Jan 15, 2021 · The cast of characters are well known: chiefly William Bligh, the cruel ship’s captain who fell foul of a mutiny led by Fletcher Christian, the sensitive master’s mate.

Oct 5, 2024 · William Bligh was the only son of Francis Bligh, a customs officer, and Jane Pearce nee Balsam. He was born in Cornwall and began his career at sea when he was eight-years-old. One of his first positions was as the captain’s servant on H.M.S. Monmouth .

Apr 28, 2020 · Get the facts on the mutiny on the Bounty. Who led the mutiny? Why did happen? And how did castaway captain William Bligh survive and make it back to England

Jul 16, 2019 · William Bligh was born on September 9, 1754, in Plymouth, England (or perhaps Cornwall), the only son of Francis and Jane Bligh. His father was Chief of Customs at Plymouth, and his mother died in 1770; Francis remarried twice more before dying himself in 1780.

Sep 15, 2023 · Lt. Bligh was an accomplished sailor, having traveled around the world on Capt. James Cook’s third circumnavigation of the globe. Bligh served as the ship’s chief navigator, called the sailing master.

William Bligh was an outstanding sailor, an accomplished navigator and a cartographer. But because of an uncompromising attitude, bad temper and tyrannical leadership style, he is most often remembered as the captain of the Bounty when its crew mutinied, and as the failed Governor of New South Wales who was overthrown by the military.

Sep 19, 2024 · Incredible the mutiny of 1789 on the Bounty was only one of three set against Lieutenant William Bligh but was his a victim or a villain. When Lieutenant William Bligh set sail for the East Indian island of Timor on 28th April 1789, he commanded an 18-man crew in a perilously overloaded 23-foot launch.